Scotland, Ireland, and the Romantic Aesthetic written by David Duff

Overview:

In this ground-breaking comparative study of Scottish and Irish Romanticism, leading scholars examine literary relations between Scotland, Ireland, and England in the period 1760-1830, an age of political upheaval and constitutional change that witnessed the Irish Rebellion, the Act of Union, major internal migration, and the cultural repositioning of Ireland and Scotland within a newly conceived 'United Kingdom.' Adopting an 'archipelagic' approach, contributors reveal how national and regional factors played a pivotal role in shaping the literary forms and cultural reception of Romantic aesthetics, with the Scottish-Irish binary serving as a ubiquitous point of reference. The essays extend existing work on the national tale and historical novel to identify previously unexplored areas of comparative inquiry such as national song, topical satire and verse romance, national painting, and travel literature. The book offers an exciting new map of the cultural geography of the Romantic era, and establishes a dynamic methodology for future comparative work.

University Of Glasgow
- Gerard Carruthers

"This is a very welcome addition to the burgeoning canon of critical material on Romanticism in Ireland and Scotland (to say nothing of Wales) since the 1990s....The essays assembled by David Duff and Catherine Jones are all useful in putting down markers and providing information on the 'Romantic aesthetic' in Scotland and Ireland."

"Bucknell University Press deserves commendation not only for the high quality of the book—the production staff did an outstanding job—but also for its commitment to studies of the long eighteenth century in general and to Scottish and Irish studies in particular. And Duff and Jones equally merit praise for the valuable contribution to an important and expanding field."